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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

War & conflict fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about war & conflict. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

5,837 published reviews in this topic

dpaWar & conflict

Une vidéo montre des feux d'artifice à Gaza début octobre 2023.

Publisher’s rating: Non ; la vidéo a été filmée à Alger, la capitale algérienne. En outre, elle circulait déjà en ligne plusieurs jours avant l'attaque du Hamas.

The claim concerned a viral video of fireworks that began circulating on social media on October 8, 2023, and was attributed by users to northern Gaza amid the escalation following Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel. The review investigated the location and timing of that specific footage, rather than whether fireworks were seen in Gaza generally. It reports that the video was also posted on TikTok, sometimes attributed to the account @ramiguerfi41, and that a Google search found it had been published by that profile on September 28. The review says the post was later deleted and that the video’s creator is unknown. To locate the scene, the agency compared visible buildings in the footage with Google Street View. It reports identifying the filming position as a building in northwestern Algiers, where the video shows recognizable façades, including one with a lit advertising sign. This visual match supports the conclusion that the footage was filmed in Algeria, not Gaza. The review also notes that the reason for the fireworks is not established: similar images were recorded on July 15, 2023, during celebrations of CR Belouizdad’s national championship victory, but the video could show a different celebration. Taken together, the reported earlier online appearance and the location comparison contradict both the claimed Gaza setting and the implication that the video documents events after October 7. The review leaves the precise occasion for the fireworks unresolved, while concluding that the footage is neither from Gaza nor from after the Hamas attack.

dpaWar & conflict

Foto toont Israëlisch neo-nazi bataljon Tal Suhar.

Publisher’s rating: Het beeld werd bewerkt. In werkelijkheid toont het de Israëlische vlag naast een groen-gele militaire vlag. De foto werd genomen in juni 2023 tijdens een militaire oefening in Marokko georganiseerd door de VS.

The claim attached a photo of smiling Israeli soldiers to an alleged “neo-Nazi” unit called Tal Suhar, pointing to what appeared to be a swastika flag beside an Israeli flag. The review says that this version of the image was altered: the original shows the Israeli flag alongside a green-and-yellow military flag, not a swastika flag. The review identifies the green-and-yellow flag as belonging to the Golani Brigade. To check the image, the investigation used reverse-image search to locate an earlier, unaltered version. It reports that Israeli media, including the Times of Israel, had shared the original photo in June 2023. The soldiers shown were in Morocco for the African Lion military exercise, rather than being evidence of the alleged unit described in the social-media claim. The exercise took place across Morocco, Ghana, Senegal and Tunisia from 13 May to 16 June 2023.

dpaWar & conflict

Die Antidiskriminierungsbeauftragte des Bundes hat bis Mittwoch, 11. Oktober kein Statement zum Terrorangriff der Hamas auf Israel veröffentlicht.

Publisher’s rating: Nein, Ferda Ataman hat bereits am Folgetag den Angriff verurteilt und ihr Mitgefühl ausgedrückt.

The claim concerned whether Ferda Ataman, the federal anti-discrimination commissioner, had remained silent about Hamas’s attack on Israel through October 11, 2023. The review says the allegation originated in a blog post dated October 11, which stated that no comment had been made by then. It describes its investigation as a search across different platforms and identifies Instagram as the place where Ataman had spoken.

Factcrescendo ThailandWar & conflict

กลุ่มเด็กชาวอิสราเอลถูกกลุ่มฮามาสจับตัวไปและขังไว้ในกรง

Publisher’s rating: Misleading

The claim concerns a social-media video of young children inside a cage, captioned as showing Israeli children captured by Hamas and held in Gaza. Factcrescendo Thailand investigated that video, rather than a separate incident involving children. Its account says the clip was circulating on Instagram and X, and that the caption identified the children as Israeli hostages. The review reports that it used reverse image search to trace the clip and found a Snopes article that examined it. Through that reporting, the review located a statement by the Hebrew-language fact-checking site FakeReporter, which said the video had been posted more than four days before the latest attacks in Israel. The review also notes that the original TikTok video was no longer viewable and that its link was broken, so the original upload could not be watched there. The review’s account of the decisive evidence is that the TikTok account holder, identified as Palestinian resident of Gaza Mazloum Fiba ladi, said on October 11 that the children in the video were his relatives, not Israeli children, and that he had posted it before the attacks in Israel on October 7. On that basis, the review concludes that the video did not show children captured by Hamas in those attacks. The timing and the account holder’s identification of the children contradict the caption’s description of the clip.